Shows / Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Welcome to the St. Hagop Church podcast, a ministry of St. Hagop Armenian Church on the Gulf Coast of Florida. The St. Hagop Church podcast shares weekly sermons, as well as special testimonies and reflections, all discerning the movement of God in the everyday life of the faithful.
Episodes
Saint Hagop Armenian ChurchWhen You Paint Your Masterpiece
What is different for Christians, though, is that we not only strive to finish our own masterworks, we allow God to finish his masterwork, which is you, and…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Faith, Hope & Love- Easter Eggs of the Soul
Paul says, don’t trust your eyes, don’t trust your vision-100%-because your hard-wired glasses, the invisible glasses by which all humans see life, is blurry…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Sabbath in the Age of Optimization
Our age is in danger of becoming-through and through-a human engineered life. Engineering is a great tool, building great science and machines. But men are not…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Everywhere & Nowhere: Reclaiming Embodied Life
That’s why Paul’s deep wisdom about the glory of the body is so important, and why each and every week when we come to worship in this church, we actual…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
What’s Worth Saving?
Well perhaps it is no surprise, that thousands of years ago, Jesus asked such questions, he was the master of such questions which-in a few words-invite us to…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Freedom’s Master
We hear a lot of talk about freedom, and truly America-relative to other countries-is a place of relative freedom.  You can criticize the government, you…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Built by Light, Not by Might
That’s the story of Etchmiadzin, which is the story of St. Hagop and all Armenian churches and people. There really is no hero in these stories, one person or…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Last Man Standing, First Among Saints
What’s the first date you put on the calendar for the year? Perhaps your birthday or that of a loved one. Maybe your wedding anniversary or your vacation…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
2 Billion Birthday Candles
That’s the only birthday gift we need, and unlike any other gift, the more you give this one away the more there is…you never run out. That’s why there is fire…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Stay Small, Pray Big
Today, St. John gives us one of the boldest promises in all of Scripture that: ‘If we ask anything (in prayer) according to His will, He hears us and we…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Motherhood Calling
Every mother since then has echoed that yes, in her own way. Not always with words. Sometimes with tears. Sometimes with whispered prayers. Sometimes with…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Put Back Again
A monk was once threatened with death by a bandit. The monk said to the bandit, “If you are going to kill me, be good enough to fulfill my dying wish. Cut off…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Church on the Way
Today’s reading from Acts gives us an even older and simpler description of this body that we partake of here at St. Hagop Armenian Apostolic Orthodox church…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Plane Down-Man Lifted
One cold January afternoon in 2009, US Airways Flight 1549 out of LaGuardia Airport in New York heading to Charlotte landed instead in the waters of the Hudson…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Sing a New Song
Today God has the message, God is the message. Don’t grasp at it, but rather allow yourself to be grasped by it. Yes today is and continues to be the greatest…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Kids vs. Parents
What is it exactly that the children are able to see that the adults cannot? In a word, love. Yes, Shakespeare wrote beautifully about love. Troubadours like…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Holy Badarak: Learn your Part, Shape your Heart-Session 5
6 Week Lenten Sermon Series (February 15th-March 22nd) Worship in the Armenian Church is a life-giving encounter with God, but only as much as we’ve learned…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Holy Badarak: Learn your Part, Shape your Heart-Session 3
6 Week Lenten Sermon Series (February 15th-March 22nd) Worship in the Armenian Church is a life-giving encounter with God, but only as much as we’ve learned…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Holy Badarak: Learn your Part, Shape your Heart-Session 2
6 Week Lenten Sermon Series (February 15th-March 22nd) Worship in the Armenian Church is a life-giving encounter with God, but only as much as we’ve learned…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Holy Badarak: Learn your Part, Shape your Heart-Session1
6 Week Lenten Sermon Series (February 15th-March 22nd) Worship in the Armenian Church is a life-giving encounter with God, but only as much as we’ve learned…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Need Beneath the Want
A woman is walking on the beach with her little grandson. Suddenly a huge wave sweeps the boy out to sea. Desperate, the woman looks up to heaven and says…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
We Shape Our Church-Our Church Shapes Us
As I often say, where a lot of other churches modern churches just say and understand things, old churches like ours actually recall, represent these holy…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Turning Point of Grace
Life is full of turning points and so are our Holy Scriptures. There are always points in life where you might have gone one way or the other, and in choosing…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Love Poured Into Creation
The Armenian Church reminds us today that this birth is neither sentimental nor symbolic. Trees, gifts nativities, these are just trifles, things. Christmas is…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Fight of Your Life
Our altar servers, who are lovers of mixed martial arts and all things Armenian, tell me that Armenian UFC fighter Arman Tsarukyan will be wrestling Lance…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Faithful With What You Have
The story is indeed about us, not about the investments we make, but the investments we are. Each of us is, first and foremost, an investment by God. Our…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Where Patience Meets Power
In our culture, waiting has come to feel like missing out like weakness.  And yet today’s reading for Advent and Christmas we are reminded of the…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Wisdom Needs to Remember-Happiness Needs to Forget
A wise man said, ‘Wisdom is founded on memory; happiness on forgetfulness.’ We tend to think of remembering and forgetting as opposites, and remembering as the…
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Superbia
The difference between good and bad pride is in its object, what it points to.  Pride is so dangerous and so often bad because-irresistibly the object of…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Take Root Downward, Bear Fruit Upward
God planted us and he hopes that we will choose to grow in his garden in a certain way.  The prophet Isaiah perfectly captures how we are to grow in words…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Your Only Prayer
Every Sunday in church we say thank you in literally one hundred different ways, in ritual, chants and prayers, it’s not too much of a stretch to say all we do…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Greatness of Smallness
We all have this tendency to make ourselves greater than we are, and make others smaller, and the consequences are division and destruction. Jesus knows this…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Soli Deo Gloria
In our Armenian Orthodox tradition, we understand sacraments as visible signs of God’s invisible grace. And what is music, if not a sacramental echo of heaven?…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
All in the Family
Taken on its face, Jesus’s words today seem to be a rejection of the deepest held value we have on earth, the family. Yes as so often the case with Our Lord…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Costume That Never Comes Off
Galatians tells us: “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.”  So I am not just being poetic and symbolic when I…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Building Wealth
Jesus wants us to pay close attention to what we are building in our lives, because it matters more than anything.  Most all of us work very hard to build…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Get Off The Forgetfulness Curve
As Chesterton famously said, Christianity has not been tried and found lacking, but it’s never been seriously tried. The Bible, from cover to cover, agrees…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
X Marks the Spot
There was a time when someone who had something of great value would often bury their treasure so that no one could find it and take it away. Of course, there…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Ephphatha!
In today’s Gospel reading Jesus heals a deaf and mute man.  But as all things with God’s word, what happened once to this one man, is a life lesson for…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
It’s Always Hurricane Season
We are deep into hurricane season here in Florida. Back one hundred and fifty years or so, hurricane season was just three months-July, August & September…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Mary’s Memoirs
Mary is not given the first and last word in our Spiritual lives merely for being a great woman, though she was, but because of what she reveals to us of her…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Teamwork Makes the Dream Work
I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. Jn 15:5 When the greatest…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Go to the Ant
God has always preferred to do great things through the humble and the meek, we read of this attribute of God’s heart nearly every Sunday. It’s the entire…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
You Have What You Need
The Apostles were teaching a crowd of followers well into the evening, such that they hadn’t eaten all day.  When they finally thought of food, it was…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Wheat & Weeds in the Armenian Highlands
I returned from Armenia a week ago, the question asked more than any other is what’s happening with the turmoil between the church and state. Sadly, it’s…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Ghost Stories
In today’s Gospel reading Jesus tells a ghost story. We adults aren’t generally into such stories, but talk to anyone in their early teens or remember when you…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Rejection Sermon
It seems that nowadays there is a podcast on every topic (including my personal favorite St. Hagop sermons). I stumbled upon one last week which resonated with…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Stop Staring!
Today’s reading from this week’s feast of Ascension, begins with an odd question.  Two angels of God ask the Apostles “Why do you stand staring into…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Voice Recognition
Voices are trustworthy and deeply personal, and since God made everything including us, he knows this. So does his Son Jesus, which is why he uses the metaphor…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Hearing Ear, The Seeing Eye
There is always a choice in what we want to see and hear, and as God’s children we don’t always make the wisest choices. We tend to hear what we want to hear…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Great Recycler
In this way you could say that the Armenian church has always been like a “recycle bin,” a “repurposing bin” for its people and for…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
The Place Seems Empty
The danger in dealing with loss, and where our faith is absolutely crucial—is that we can easily get stuck in our loss, in our grief; I see it all the time and…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Heavy Things
There is an old story of two travelling monks, which might help us remember to put down our burdens and seek up for God. These monks come to a river where a…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Yes Day
My son Narek’s birthday was on Friday and when asked what he wants for his birthday, he prizes one gift above all others. I want a yes day.  If you aren’t…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
Orthodox, evangelical, apostolic & catholic!
In the final Session of the Lenten Nicene Creed Sermon Series, Fr. Hovnan discusses the final end of God’s amazing relationship with humankind, to raise…
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Filled & Fulfilled by God’s Spirit
And so that’s the Holy Spirit as presented in the words of the Creed. It is like the air we breathe, so hard to notice because we have been in it, but more…
- Saint Hagop Armenian Church
God Enters HisStory
Last week we saw that the Creed gives us only 18 words to describe God the Father last week, because though words like Father and Creator point to His nature…
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Love Beyond Words
In the second session of our Lenten Sermon series on the Nicene Creed, we talk about God the Father, a God so great that we must choose our words very, very…